Cibus Restaurant Opening in October

Levenshulme’s Cibus restaurant, run as a pop-up at Fred’s Ale House, is moving into new premises in what is currently the M19 Bar. People will also know Cibus from their stall on Levenshulme Market. Cibus Ristorante is scheduled to open on 14 October.

Cibus founder Giorgio Fontana has been working with Head Chef Marco Bracchitta to expand their menu and bring a complete Italian dining experience to their new restaurant. M19 is undergoing a full refit and will include refreshed, relaxed outside space at the rear with a “Balearic seaside shack” vibe.

Click HERE to read a report from Manchester Confidential including discussion of the history and development of Cibus and their approach to ingredients, wine and drink and their progress to their new restaurant in Levenshulme.

Levenshulme Market Future Secured

Levenshulme Market has secured its future for the next four years following approval of their planning application.

Planning permission has been granted for the the Market to operate for another four years. Although the market had originally hoped to extend its operation throughout the year and add Sunday markets and more Friday night markets to what it does the application has ended up with arrangements pretty much the same as are currently in place.

There is a blog post on the Levenshulme Market website by Richard Hirst, Market Manager, outlining their experience in securing the renewed operating permission. The post outlines with some frustration the bureaucracy involved, delays, and lack of support from both Manchester City Council and local councillors.

Although this experience does not appear to have been particularly positive for Levenshulme Market the main positive is that the future of the market has been secured at the heart of Levenshulme for several years to come.

“Levenshulme Market is here for another four years. Which is great news and an enormous relief. But the lesson for us is that, while Levenshulme Market may be thriving – with thousands of customers each week, awards under its belt, generating enormous high street footfall, organising financial projects to support our local area – there’s no assurance it won’t find its future at risk once again. We dearly hope we won’t have a repeat of this ordeal in future, but in four years’ time you could once again be called on to help- keep Levenshulme Market open.”

Levenshulme Market blog post, 12 july 2021

You can also read a report of Levenshulme Market’s success in securing its future in the MEN HERE

Levenshulme Market runs from March to December. Current dates are available HERE

Levenshulme Market Cancellations

Notice from the Levenshulme Market Team:

Hello everyone.

Due to yesterday’s advice from the government we have taken the decision to cancel the rest of our markets for the month of March.

This means there will sadly be no birthday party Night Market this Friday, and no Saturday market on 28th March.

We’re awaiting further clarification on whether it will be possible to continue with our events in Levenshulme in the coming months. The situation is very much a live one at present and making any concrete decisions for our future is deeply challenging. But as a community hub our priority remains the safety and wellbeing of our customers, traders and staff.

The situation we find ourselves in comes as a huge blow both to the market and to our traders. Markets exist due to small businesses born out of passion and dedication whose survival depends on opportunities to trade. Cutting off those opportunities gives us no pleasure and we would like to take a moment to add our voice to those venues and events organisers who have highlighted how unreasonable it feels that a decision of such magnitude has been left in our hands.

We’re hopeful that there will be some clarification very soon on how businesses such as ours are expected to cope with the decisions we’ve found ourselves having to make, and any future plans for our markets will be made accordingly.

Due to the recent announcement as well as the University of Manchester’s decision to cancel all in-person seminars, we have also taken the decision to cancel all of the Tuesday lunchtime food markets we run at UoM for the time being.

However, while the market may not be open for business we will still be here for you, working away on ways for you to support independent traders, amplifying those doing good work for the community here in Levenshulme and looking forward to a future when shopping, street food and socialising are safe once again.

Until then, please be kind to one another, support independent local businesses where you can and look out for those who may need help in these testing times.

The Levy Market Team

Monthly Levenshulme Night Markets Start Today

The very popular night markets have been special occasions before. From today they go monthly replacing the Saturday market once a month moving to every third Friday of the month. Food and fun from 17.00-21.00.

Clean Up Levenshulme Event

Pauline Johnson who runs the LoveLevenshulme website has teamed up with Levenshulme Market for a one day litter picking event.

“Love Levenshulme have teamed up with the Levenshulme Market crew at the relaunch of their 2017 season (YES!). On Saturday 4th of March at 10am we’re doing a big community litter pick, a proactive approach and hoping to tackle attitudes towards flytipping in the area with a community stall/info point and posters dotted about the district centre in advance. We need to rally the cleaning troops!”

Full details are available HERE

Levenshulme Market Seeks Two Directors

Levenshulme Market is looking for two Directors with specific knowledge and expertise in:

  • Community and trader liaison
  • Finance and HR

“Levenshulme Market is looking for two new amazing people to step up and become part of our board of directors. You won’t get rich (the role is unpaid, with a few notable exceptions) and you will have to commit around 10 hours a month but in return you will have an amazing experience, contributing to the work of a fun, sociable social enterprise that is at the heart of a vibrant and exciting community. You’ll get to learn more than you ever knew about the goings on behind the scenes at the Market (and in Levenshulme – we know ALL the gossip), be able to use it to build your professional skills and network AND it will look great on your CV.”

Full information is available HERE


(Photograph courtesy Levensulme Market website)

Levenshulme Beer, Gin and Food Festival

The Levenshulme beer, gin and food festival is a three day event over the August bank holiday.
Held at the Klondyke Club (1 Burnage Range) the festival will be combined with the famous Levenshulme Market on the Saturday (held in the station car park) and promises fun for all the family.

  • Over 20 ales, 20 gins, 3 lagers, & 2 ciders to try.
  • Various street food stalls.
  • Live music & dj sets.
  • Bouncy castle, face painting and field games for the children and families.

FREE ENTRY.

More Levenshulme loveliness in the summer. A not to be missed event!

  • Saturday 27th August, 12.00-late (market 12.00-18.00)
  • Sunday 28th August 12.00-late
  • Monday 29th August 12.00-late 

Levenshulme Market Community Shindig

Come along to Levenshulme Market on Friday 29th April for stalls, fun, food, music and information on local community groups.

Timeout Loves Levenshulme

A few reasons to love Levenshulme by Becci Johnson in Timeout:

  • You baulk at the prospect of another A6 takeaway.
  • You’ve gotten to know your neighbours through visiting Levy Market.
  • You’ve gotten to know your neighbours through visiting Levy Market.
  • You monitor the seasons by driving up Errwood Road, whilst you fight the urge to stop and buy biscuits.
  • You know how to find the secret lake.
  • You smile wryly at tourists taking selfies on a nameless street.

You could fill the whole magazine with reasons why Levenshulme is so great, though.

Read the full article HERE.

  

Planning Forum Public Events

Levenshulme Neighbourhood Planning Forum (LNPF) public events.
Come along and find out about the LNPF and how our community can influence local planning issues.
What matters to you? Green spaces? Affordable housing? Improving our High Street? Supporting businesses for local jobs? Protecting buildings? Takeaways? Parking? Litter? Transport?
Everyone is welcome to get involved and help decide what the priorities and desires are for people who live and work in Levenshulme. This will become our plan for our community.
Saturday 31st October

09.30-16.30

Levenshulme Library (Cromwell Grove)
Thursday 5th November

15.00-19.00

Inspire Centre (Stockport Road)
Saturday 7th November

10.00-16.00

Levenshulme Market (Station Car Park)

  

World Record Conga Today

It’s not every day a world record attempt happens in Levenshulme.

A world record attempt at the longest distance conga will set off from Manchester Piccadilly at 11.00 heading for Stockport Train Station, going through Levenshulme past our lovely Market around midday.

  

Levenshulme Market Fund 2015: LCAC Update

Here’s an update from Levenshulme Contemporary Art Collective (LCAC) on what they did with the funding awarded from the Levenshulme Market Fund 2015.

Levenshulme people working together to help our community be the most dynamic and creative in Manchester.
Check out the update on the Levenshulme Market website HERE

Seventeen Days of Art, Philosophy and Action in Levenshulme

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre (LCAC) activities start today with an exhibition at Bankley Mill (19.00) and a launch party at Fred’s Ale House (21.00). Even before that readings on the Village Green happen at 12.00 and 20.00.

Details are available HERE

There are loads of events and activities on over the next seventeen days from imaginary bike rides to a marathon reading of Das Kapital Karl Marx, discussions about regeneration, home and the urban environment, readings and discussions of work by Marxist geographer David Harvey, Communist era children’s games from Poland and a public intervention to highlight access to public services at the railway station: “To show our desire to use the station we will form a queue to fail to get up the stairs.”

Far from failing LCAC are showing what can be achieved with £2,210 funding from Levenshulme Market Fund to produce a packed programme of events by Levenshulme artists, philosophers and residents to revitalise our High Street and attract people to our community.

This is genuine local direct action and imagination at work and what fringe events should be all about during the Manchester International Festival. An explosion of creativity emerging organically from a vibrant, diverse, challenging and exciting community like Levenshulme.

  

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre Summer Programme 

The Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre Summer Programme has been published. A packed series of events, readings and activities spread over seventeen days to coincide with Manchester International Festival.

The Fringe comes to Levenshulme courtesy of our own artists, philosophers and academics and enabled by a grant of £2,210 from the Levenshulme Market Fund 2015.

Highlights are listed below and a full interactive programme is available HERE

LCAC are also raising money for the Wood Street Mission by undertaking a  live reading of all three volumes of Karl Marx’s Capital on Levenshulme Village Green.
LCAC Programme 

Friday 10 July 2015 | Housing

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Use Value and Exchange Value 
  • (Time tbc) Chris Hamer – Bankley opening  
  • (Time tbc) Opening Party at Fred’s  

Saturday 11 July 2015 | What is Money?

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • The Social Value of Labour and its Representations by Money 
  • 2pm – 4pm Children’s Games from Communist Poland 
  • Sunday 12 July 2015 | Private Property
  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Private Property and the Capitalist State 
  • (Time tbc) Discussion: Modern Slavery in Manchester 
  • (Time tbc) Philosophy for Kids 

Monday 13 July 2015 | Us and the Banks

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Private Appropriation and the Common Wealth 
  • Tuesday 14 July 2015 | Money and Work
  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Capital and Labour 
  • (Time tbc) Art Art Labour  

Wednesday 15 July 2015 | What Does Money Do?

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Capital as Process or Thing? 

Thursday 16 July 2015 | Making and Selling

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • The Contradictary Unity of Production and Realisation 
  • (Time tbc) Zine Workshop with The Edge of the Universe Printing Press 

Friday 17 July 2015 | Work and Technology

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Technology, Work and Human Disposability 
  • (Time tbc) Old Projectors  
  • 9pm Film Screening on the Village Green  

Saturday 18 July 2015 | Who Does What Job?

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Divisions of Labour 
  • 11am – 12pm Failed Journeys 
  • 2pm – 4pm Discussion: What is Home? 
  • 5:30pm – 7pm Exhibition Talk and Walking Tour  
  • 9pm Film Screening at Bankley Studios  

Sunday 19 July 2015 | Competition

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Monopoly and Competition: Centralisation and Decentralisation 
  • (Time tbc) Orçamento Participativo: Stockie Road to Rio… and back… 
  • 2pm – 4pm Philosophy for Kids 
  • 6pm – 8pm Performance: Case Studies in Joint Action 

Monday 20 July 2015 | Town Planning

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Uneven Geographical Developments and the Production of Space 

Tuesday 21 July 2015 | The Rich and the Poor

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Disparities of Income and Wealth 
  • (Time tbc) Talk: Homelessness  

Wednesday 22 July 2015 | Family Life

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Social Reproduction 
  • (Time tbc) Pregnant then Screwed  

Thursday 23 July 2015 | What is Freedom?

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Freedom and Domination 
  • (Time tbc) Philosophy for Kids 

Friday 24 July 2015 | Endless Growth

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Endless Compound Growth 
  • (Time tbc) Round Table Discussion 
  • (Time tbc) Portfolio Review: Is Debt Worth It?  
  • 9pm Film Screening on the Village Green (TBC)  

Saturday 25 July 2015 | Destroying the Planet

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • Capital’s Relation to Nature 
  • 2pm – 4pm Children’s Games from Communist Poland 
  • 4pm – 5pm Owl Project: iLog Talk and Demo  

Sunday 26 July 2015 | How Will It End?

  • 12pm + 8pm Reading Group: Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (David Harvey)
  • The Revolt of Human Nature: Universal Alienations 
  • (Time tbc) Painting Levenshulme’s Rubbish 

 LCAC Market Fund 2015 Bid Summary

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre
LCAC Shop
Bidding for: £2210.00
FULLY FUNDED
The LCAC Shop will be a temporary, non-profit making hub of radical thinking for the Levenshulme community. It will open for two weeks during the Manchester International Festival (2nd-19th July 2015), with the aim of helping to seed the development of a future independent fringe festival. The Shop will function as an open social space, the aim of which is to create the possibility of imagining a new locality. It will serve coffee, sell radical texts and work/prints by local artists, and host free public talks, including connecting participants with other radically-minded individuals across the world via video-conferencing. It will be open to the public at varied times, including late nights for post-work discussions. The group are bidding for funds to run the shop, including rental and fittings, marketing and promotion of the space and paying/reimbursing visiting speakers and artists.
(Information from Levenshulme Market)

  
 Photos courtesy LCAC / Gautam Narayanan

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre Summer 2015

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre (LCAC) will be holding a series of events and discussions this summer made possible by a £2,210 grant from the Levenshulme Market Fund. LCAC explain their aims as:

Levenshulme Contemporary Arts Centre is an incomplete gallery that questions land use and relations of power within suburban Manchester. We are interested in expanding conventions of artistic display beyond the architectural limits of the gallery.”

This summer we will be opening the LCAC shop. It will be a temporary high street hub of radical thinking, hosting meetings, discussions and a series of coordinated arts events that will work with different sectors of the local community to address the relationship between land use, constructions of community, accessibility to the arts and the possibility of an urban commons.”

The Levenshulme Market Fund grant will enable activities in a shop from 2nd-19th July 2015.

The LCAC Shop will be a temporary, non-profit making hub of radical thinking for the Levenshulme community. It will open for two weeks during the Manchester International Festival (2nd-19th July 2015), with the aim of helping to seed the development of a future independent fringe festival. The Shop will function as an open social space, the aim of which is to create the possibility of imagining a new locality. It will serve coffee, sell radical texts and work/prints by local artists, and host free public talks, including connecting participants with other radically-minded individuals across the world via video-conferencing. It will be open to the public at varied times, including late nights for post-work discussions. The group are bidding for funds to run the shop, including rental and fittings, marketing and promotion of the space and paying/reimbursing visiting speakers and artists.

(Levenshulme Market Fund bid information)

Plans for LCAC

  • A daily reading group pulling apart a work by urban geographer David Harvey
  • A theatrical enactment of what it means to act together
  • A chance to play some children’s games from Communist Poland
  • An exhibition of abstract paintings exploring urban degeneration and regeneration
  • Creative writing workshops
  • Improvised music
  • Zine-making
  • An artists’ residency
  • A round-table discussion with leading Manchester academics
  • An informal discussion about home, belonging, nostalgia and collective memories
  • Swedish artists sharing their experiences as migrants through images and text


Further Information

LCAC Website: HERE

LCAC Facebook: HERE
LCAC YouTube Channel HERE
Email: info@lcac.org.uk

LCAC Works

To get an idea of what LCAC does please see below for a link to LCAC Work No.1 (video) and extracts from LCAC Work No.2 (interview text).

LCAC Work No.1
View the YouTube video  HERE

LCAC Work No. 2
(extracts)
Dr Joseph Kisolo-Ssonko

What is LCAC?

Director 1

Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre is a gallery in Levenshulme, South Manchester, a suburb with a mixed population. It’s a gallery without walls and without anything much else other than the idea of an institution itself. We opened the gallery in a green space that had temporarily become a used car showroom in Levenshulme.

Director 2

We had a sign, we had an audience.

The sign started as an art object exhibited alongside paintings and other sculptures in an exhibition called A6 in Bankley Art Gallery.

It also had an attachment on the back of it which made it adaptable to become a sign. Then we took it for a walk down the A6, along with the audience from the exhibition, to a predetermined site on the corner of Pennington St – a patch of wasteland that was being informally used as a used-car and drugs salesroom.

Where this site met the A6 there was also an empty post. We erected the sign on this and invited people to walk from the pavement on to the wasteland.

Dr Joseph Kisolo-Ssonko
Did the wasteland itself become the artwork?

Director 2
We are interested the relationship between performance and actuality – the extent to which something is an x if you act as if it is an x and it is received as an x.

We explored the possibility of transformation that you describe through the strategic staging of an art opening on the site – champagne, speeches, gesturing at exhibits etc. In a sense it was a kind of social experiment.

Dr Joseph Kisolo-Ssonko
Was the idea that the space should be seen as empty of art that the found objects were themselves supposed to be seen as artworks?

Director 1

Actually when the launch happened we were surprised to find an exhibition ready made for us in a way. We had this idea of a marginal space and we were really excited about that but when we arrived there there were actually really interesting things to look at and – in a surprising way – I think that it did become a really rich visual experience. The burnt out caravan and discarded plush sofas were visually interesting.

Director 2

The site’s marginal but somehow multivalent functionality brought credibility to the suggestion that such things could be encountered as art. Playfulness seemed to have been in-built within materiality of the site by its recent history. We simply added one further mode of appropriation to the existing set of uses, the ‘as if’ that we have already spoken about.

Director 1

The site had a kind of awkwardness in this sense. We never found out who actually owned the space – it could have been quite a nice green space and but at the moment it was being used as a car lot as to sell drugs.

So, the space was replete in opportunity in the way that a predetermined gallery was not because it would have a predetermined function encoded within its architecture; a function that guides behaviour.

   
  

     All photos and text of LCAC Works courtesy of and copyright LCAC

Levenshulme Food and Drink Festival Hits the News

Manchester Evening News reported on the Levenshulme Food and Drink Festival.

There will be more than 75 events across the village between Friday, June 12 and Sunday, June 21.

Fred’s Ale House owner and Levenshulme Pub Company director, Lawrence Hennigan, said: “It looks like another fantastic line up of events, the festivals organisers need to be commended on the huge variety of events they have managed to include in the celebration of the area’s diverse cultures.

Read the full article HERE
Visit the Fadfest website HERE

Love Levenshulme website relaunch

The Love Levenshulme website has now been relaunched. The website was originally developed with funding from Manchester City Council but it has now had a major revamp and been relaunched with a grant of £5,000 from the Levenshulme Market Fund. The site has evolved from a listings site to a blog and now a magazine format.

The new website “…is a celebration of the things that make our community great; from the famous Levenshulme Market, our award winning Naawab banqueting hall, to the renowned Bankley Studios and Gallery.”

“As it takes these first tentative steps we hope you will join Love Levenshulme on its journey of adaptation. We are here to help deliver real change to the high street, solidify the vibrant community spirit and boulder the energies of the people who live and work here.

The project is coordinated by Pauline Johnson.

The Market Fund summary is provided here for reference:

Love Levenshulme is a digital and high street community asset. It was first created as an online map in 2014 and resident Pauline Johnson is seeking funds to develop it as a resource that will support local businesses, improve our trading environment, expand as a “live learning facility” and promote Levenshulme as a visitor destination. It’s a consumer facing, trader focused online resource and high street brand. The funds, if allocated, will be used to develop the site itself, to support engagement activity with traders and to launch a pop-up high street “hub” for the site, allowing business owners, residents and visitors to make their own contribution to its workings.

Have a look around the Love Levenshulme website HERE

  

Easter and Spring at Levenshulme Market

Easter and Spring activities at Levenshulme Market on 4th and 11th April. Prizes, special offers and free fun for kids.

  

Levenshulme Market Finalist in BBC Food & Farming Awards 2015

Levenshulme Market is one of only three finalists in the prestigious BBC Food and Farming Awards 2015 market category.

The weekly market has been recognised for pioneering work as a social enterprise which helps to empower its community to take ownership of the high street in Levenshulme through its Market Fund, launched this year, as well as being providing a “diverse range of high quality traders, with a changing roster of 50 artisan traders, [including] a variety of fresh produce and street food” and developing the market into a quality destination for food and drink retailers that has changed the face of markets in Manchester.

Read the full story on the Levenshulme Market website HERE

The BBC press release announcing the 2015 finalists is available HERE



Photograph courtesy of Levenshulme Market

Levenshulme Market Fund 2015 Results

In a packed meeting at the Klondyke this evening voting took place for the Levenshulme Market Fund 2015. The following bids were funded to the amount shown. This means that everyone who bid for funding received funding as the LCDC bid was withdrawn. £15,000 was available for distribution.

Congratulations to all the successful bids and everyone who put in so much hard work for them. And well done to Levenshulme Market for their first fund reinvesting in Levenshulme.

Levenshulme Market is registered as a Community Interest Company. This is the first distribution of operating profits to community projects that are focussed on enabling local people to start up on the market or to existing local businesses to develop and revitalise Levenshulme High Street and its retail and business offer.

Levenshulme Market itself has gone from strength to strength over the past couple of years and went weekly from March to December last year. In 2015 Levenshulme Market Company will also start running markets at Manchester University and in the Northern Quarter.

Find out more about Levenshulme Market HERE

Winning proposals and amounts

Byrne the Cake Brewery – £610.56

David Foulger is a Levenshulme resident who has been perfecting his brewing in his home environment for six months and is now approaching the stage where he is ready to start trading on the market, thus launching Levenshulme’s own artisan brewery and helping gain more attention for Levenshulme’s independent traders and producers. David will use the money, if awarded, to buy equipment that will allow him to brew on a larger scale with a shorter time scale and less chance of spoilage.




Decourcey Designs – £760.00

Sharlene Decourcey is fourth generation Levenshulme and started her business trading in the Antiques Village a year ago. She would like to develop her skills, expand into market trading and build her business by undertaking further  training in upholstery, buying tools for her work and producing branded clothes, banners and business cards.



Indulge Dessert Café Expansion – £1400.00

Indulge is the only dessert cafe within the Levenshulme stretch of Stockport Road and they are keen to build their business by expanding their product range (to include pancakes, frozen yoghurt, slushies and professional coffees), increase their profile and visibility and make physical improvements to the shop. The funds they are applying for would be used to repaint the shop shutters and improve the signage, change the layout to improve service and maximise customer seating during busy periods, add customer toilet facilities, deliver a leaflet campaign in the area and purchase machines for making coffee, pancakes and frozen yoghurt.



Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre – £2210.00

The LCAC Shop will be a temporary, non-profit making hub of radical thinking for the Levenshulme community. It will open for two weeks during the Manchester International Festival (2nd-19th July 2015), with the aim of helping to seed the development of a future independent fringe festival. The Shop will function as an open social space, the aim of which is to create the possibility of imagining a new locality. It will serve coffee, sell radical texts and work/prints by local artists, and host free public talks, including connecting participants with other radically-minded individuals across the world via video-conferencing. It will be open to the public at varied times, including late nights for post-work discussions. The group are bidding for funds to run the shop, including rental and fittings, marketing and promotion of the space and paying/reimbursing visiting speakers and artists.



Lily and Daisy Flower Company – £890.00

The Lily and Daisy Flower Company will be based in Levenshulme as a market stall and local delivery service, operating by bike and selling only flowers sourced locally in season and from indoor growing operations in England and the Netherlands at other times, with the aim of being carbon neutral within two years of starting business. Melvyn Newton, who runs the Lily and Daisy Flower Company is bidding for funds for a bike trailer, a street trading licence, insurance and branding.



Love Levenshulme www.lovelevenshulme.org – £5000.00

Love Levenshulme is a digital and high street community asset. It was first created as an online map in 2014 and resident Pauline Johnson is seeking funds to develop it as a resource that will support local businesses, improve our trading environment, expand as a “live learning facility” and promote Levenshulme as a visitor destination. It’s a consumer facing, trader focused online resource and high street brand. The funds, if allocated, will be used to develop the site itself, to support engagement activity with traders and to launch a pop-up high street “hub” for the site, allowing business owners, residents and visitors to make their own contribution to its workings.



Samosa Shack – £1000.00

Samosa Shack is the brain child of Levenshulme resident Kamini Patel, who would like to develop an artisan food stall where he can sell Gujarati cuisine – particularly samosas, which will be made to order while customers wait.  He has applied for the fund to cover the costs of buying the equipment associated with setting up an outdoor hot food business as well as branding and design work to make his stall attractive to customers.



Thairish Café – Facelift – £2370.00

Levenshulme institution Thairish Café (previously Isis) are applying for funds to make their business an even more desirable destination on the high street and the interior will be a more welcoming and cleaner environment for customers. They would use the money, if awarded, to update the front of the cafe by cleaning and painting the outside area – meaning they will be more attractive to customers, particularly those coming to and from the market. They would also like to refurbish their customer toilet, making it a safer and cleaner environment, and to resurface the floor of the café.


Woolly Mammoth – £750.00

Woolly Mammoth is brings together locally sourced UK wool and vegetarian food with a focus on promoting positive mental health and well being.  The social enterprise, run by Levenshulme resident Charlotte Dillon and business partner Rachel Hall, will launch with a series of pop-up events at Levenshulme Market, with a view to eventually move to a shop space in Levenshulme. They will use the funds, if awarded, to cover the costs of buying equipment to cook their food, starter stock and branding.



All photographs courtesy of Jeremy Hoad.

Levenshulme Market Fund 2015 – Shortlist Announced

A message from Helen Power about the 2015 Levenshulme Market Fund:

Applications to the fund for 2015 have now closed. We have been inundated with excellent applications and, because we got roughly twice as many as we were expecting we have had to short list the candidates.

Thankfully, we have a trusty group of independent assessors who had agreed to act as supervisors for the applications and the voting and they have very kindly worked together to produce a short list from the applicants received. The short listed applicants/projects are as follows:

  1. Byrne the Cake Brewery
  2. Decourcey Designs
  3. Indulge Dessert Café – Expansion
  4. LCDC – Craft in the Community
  5. Levenshulme Contemporary Art Centre – LCAC Shop
  6. Lily and Daisy Flower Company
  7. Love Levenshulme
  8. Samosa Shack
  9. Thairish Café – Facelift
  10. Woolly Mammoth

Further information about the voting event and the voting process are on our website HERE

What’s Going On Around The Station And Market?

If you wondered what was happening around the station and the market it is a clean up funded by the council’s Clean City fund.

This project is being led by Incredible Edible Levenshulme with Levenshulme Market Community Interest Company and other groups such as Levenshulme Youth Project. It is an interesting collaboration of groups and people across Levenshulme to improve our environment.

All sorts of things are part of the project from the mural on the container in the car park to tidying up trees and vegetation around the site, installing new planters on the A6, planting and improving the Village Green and installing trendy bike racks that double up as planters. This promises to make a big difference to the area and everyone is welcome to get involved.

A summary of the project is available on the council website HERE and a schedule of planned work has just been released (see below). A more detailed description of the project is available HERE one the Levenshulme Market website.

Bike racks to be installed on the station car park and planted with blueberry bushes.

Levenshulme Market Fund 2015

Levenshulme Market is awarding £15,000 worth of grants to people who want to make a difference to Levenshulme high street or to start or develop their own retail businesses.

As a social enterprise, the team behind Levenshulme Market have always been loud proponents of the idea that bad high streets don’t happen to economically healthy retail environments and that putting a market into a high street with multiple problems is not going to solve those problems overnight.

That is why, for their first ever Market Fund, they will be awarding £15,000-worth of grants to people who want to make a difference to Levenshulme high street and residents who want to start or develop their own retail businesses. Not only that, but they are asking the community to choose what they should fund.

The team are now taking applications for their “high street innovation fund” which will take applications for grants up to £5000 and are open to anyone who has a retail or high street improvement project they would like to deliver in Levenshulme and for their “market innovation fund” which is designed for Levenshulme residents who want to start or improve their own business on the market and is taking applications up to £1000.

The Market is on hiatus through the winter months but will restart on Saturday 7th March 2015 and will operate every Saturday this year until December.

The the final decisions on who will be funded by the scheme will be made by Levenshulme residents at an event being held on Sunday 8th March 2015, 5.00pm – 9.00pm, at The Klondyke Club, Burnage Range, Levenshulme, M19 2HQ.

Further information about the awards, how to enter and how to attend the voting event is available HERE

For more information please contact Helen Power, Director, Levenshulme Market CIC:
T: 07853 266 598
E: info@levymarket.co.uk
W: www.levymarket.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/levymarket
Twitter: @levymarket

Incredible Edible Levenshulme Tidy Up & Litter Pick

Please join us on Sunday (15th Feb) to continue our work preparing the woodland area at Levenshulme Market. We’ll also be doing a litter pick.

Meet 10am on Sunday at the container in the train station car park. Please wear wellies and bring gardening tools.

Hope to see you there.

Incredible Edible Levenshulme
Growing a greener, cleaner, healthier Levenshulme!

Feel the Spirit of Manchester at Levenshulme Market

Levenshulme Market is collaborating with The Spirit of Manchester Festival in the last two weeks of September to host some very special Spirit of Manchester Markets.

The markets will take place on Saturday 20th and Saturday 27th September and we have arranged to have a number of FREE stalls at each market available for community groups, organisations working in the community and charities. The stalls will allow them to showcase their work in the community to new audiences in whatever way they choose – from handing out flyers on their work and ways to get involved to demonstrations of the skills they are building amongst their users.

We are now looking for community groups to join us in celebrating what they do and raising awareness for any support they may need. If you are a group working in Manchester, or you know of a group or organisation you think should be represented please get in touch with us by emailing info@levymarket.com. Full support will be given in helping to develop your ideas and making sure that you get the word out about the work you are doing.

This is in addition to the single free stall that Levenshulme Market offers every week to community groups working in Levenshulme – so if you’re working in the area but aren’t able to make the dates above please do still get in touch with us to find out how you can promote your work to our shoppers.

The Spirit of Manchester Festival is taking place from the 19th-28th September and is being co-ordinated by Manchester Community Central (MACC) as a celebration of the fantastic on-going work of the volunteer and community sector across the city.

If you have any queries regarding the festival then please visit their website HERE.

Win for Levenshulme in Towns Alive Awards

Towns Alive Awards 2014 West Zone Enterprise Category Winner: Levenshulme Market

A community-run street market has doubled its expectations for stallholder numbers, becoming “one of the most enjoyable and profitable markets to trade at in the North West” – and winning the West Zone Enterprise Category in the Towns Alive Awards.

Levenshulme Market – a community interest company which began trading in March 2013 after the failure of a short-lived predecessor – has developed from a monthly to a weekly market, and will distribute around £15,000 in Awards for residents to start market businesses and for market traders to grow their businesses into viable enterprises to operate on Levenshulme high street.

The market was established specifically to help regenerate the local high street retail environment – building skills, creating jobs and regenerating the economy. The business model is unique, say organisers: “we have a specific remit to empower the community to take ownership of their retail environment and build the skills, confidence and capacity of local people to create earning potential and increase the range of choice and opportunity.”

Judges’ comments:

“The disparity between a dying high street and an appetite for alternative shopping destinations is endemic in the UK. Levenshulme Market shows that there is a natural, profitable, community-led solution.”

See the Towns Alive website HERE

 

Levenshulme Market Community Stall – free publicity for your group

Did you know that Levenshulme Market has a free stall available every week for community groups?

Every week there is a space available at the popular Levenshulme Market for community groups to promote what they are doing in the area. You could use the space for anything – from a demonstration of the ball room dancing your group has been learning to handing out leaflets on your volunteering opportunities or ways that people can seek your support – the only thing that the stall can’t be used for is selling.

Stalls can be booked in advance by emailing the Market with your preferred dates and what you will be doing to and the organisers will come back to you to confirm all the details.

Email: info@levymarket.com

Levenshulme Market container mural

The shipping container provide by the council for Levenshulme Market to store equipment has now been painted with a mural.

This is part of ongoing investment to tidy up the main Levenshulme car park, around the railway station and part of the A6 funded by a £25,000 Clean and Green award to Incredible Edible Levenshulme.

It is great to see investment by Manchester City Council in Levenshulme supporting local groups with businesses such as Levenshulme Market and community groups working together to improve Levenshulme.

A lot more work is planned including a green roof on the container, new planters, bike racks and landscaping around the car park. Further information is available HERE

(Thanks to Jamie Whittaker for the photo)

market container mural

Craft Fair at Inspire

The first of Inspire’s Craft Fairs of 2014 is on Saturday 22nd February, 11.00-15.30. Come along and find some local Levy loveliness.

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Levenshulme Market – public forum on changes

Levenshulme Market is changing!

Residents of Levenshulme will know that in 2014 there will be some big changes at the market, but do you know why?

We want local people to help us shape the impact we have on our high street and this Saturday we are holding a forum for you to find out more, share your ideas and ask those burning questions.

Saturday 25th January, 6pm-8pm at the Klondyke (1 Burnage Range, Levenshulme, Manchester, M19 2HQ).

More information on Levenshulme Market is available on the completely redesigned website HERE.